Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across the NCAA. Throughout the year we ask questions of the most plugged-in Mid-Major fans and fans across the country.

Loyola Chicago is honoring Sister Jean with a statue this Friday on what would have been her 107th birthday.

So, that got us thinking: who should be the next mid-major legend to be given a statue?

Pete Carril, Greg Kampe, Bill Russell, Steph Curry, Steve Nash or Buddy the Street Dog?

Pete Carril

Carril was the architect of the Princeton offense. His Tiger teams were rock solid on defense and led the nation in scoring defense 14 times. The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall-of-Famer won 13 Ivy League championships and retired as the only coach to win 500 games without scholarship players. Carril led Princeton to the 1975 NIT championship.

Greg Kampe

Kampe is gearing up for his 43^rd season with Oakland and is the longest-tenured active Division I men’s basketball coach, ranking third all-time in DI behind Jim Phelan (49 seasons), Phog Allen (49 seasons), and Jim Boeheim (47 seasons). The 2026-27 season moves Kampe ahead of Mike Krzyzewski. Kampe oversaw the Golden Grizzlies’ transition to Division I and pioneered one of the best March Madness upsets in recent memory as Oakland and hot-shooting Jack Gohlke took down Kentucky.

“Consistency is the hallmark of success,” is one of Kampe’s favorite quotes.

After all, he was voted our sexiest mid-major coach back in 2022.

Bill Russell

One of the greatest players in basketball history, Russell suited up for San Francisco before winning 11 titles with the Boston Celtics. He played with the Dons in the 1950s and guided them to back-to-back national championships in 1955 and 1956. USF won 55 consecutive games, and Russell is the career leader in rebounds for the program with 1,606. A recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Russell was a staunch advocate for social justice. The WCC adopted the “Russell Rule,” which ensures that all schools in the conference consider candidates from underrepresented groups when interviewing for athletic administrator and coaching vacancies.

Steph Curry

We all remember Curry nearly shooting No. 10-seed Davidson into the Final Four. The guard’s run in the 2008 NCAA Tournament was nothing short of miraculous. It put his name in the national lexicon of basketball before he became the NBA career 3-point leader and changed the game with his approach to shooting. Curry led the nation in scoring in 2009 and broke the single-season 3-point record in 2008. Four NBA titles and a couple of MVPs later, Curry and his legacy live on.

Steve Nash

Nash put together one of the best college careers with Santa Clara and led the Broncos to three WCC championships and NCAA Tournament appearances. He ranks among the top 10 in program history in points, steals, assists, and free-throw percentage. The two-time NBA MVP led both the Phoenix Suns and Dallas Mavericks to the Western Conference Finals and had his number retired by both Santa Clara and the Suns. He went on to become a consultant and helped guide the Warriors to back-to-back titles with Curry as one of the star players.

Buddy the Street Dog

OK, let’s have a little fun with this one. Buddy the Street Dog is the “spirit animal” for the Queens men’s basketball team. The two-foot replica of a German Shepard joined the Royals this season as they reached the NCAA Tournament in their first season of eligibility after transitioning to Division I. Buddy is awarded postgame to the player whose contributions to the team’s success may not show up in the box score (taking charges or diving for loose ball).

“We want [the players] to embody the street dog mentality of fighting for everything you can get,” Queens head coach Grant Leonard said.

Both Queens and Buddy are a perfect 1-for-1 when eligible to reach the NCAA Tournament.

Editor note: Damian Lillard and Artis Gilmore were also discussed.

Lillard is painted on a horse statue in Ogden, Utah, where he starred for Weber State.

Why a horse and not an actual statue depicting Lillard? Lillard has a fear of statues.

“I’ve always been scared of historic stuff like that. If I see statues of Jesus, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr. — all that stuff kind of gives me a funny feeling,” Lillard said back in 2012 on a trip to Washington, D.C. during his rookie season with the Portland Trailblazers.

Gilmore will have his statue at Jacksonville University unveiled next May. Nicknamed “The A-Train,” Gilmore led the 1970 national championship game, where the Dolphins fell to UCLA.

Gilmore went on to have a hall-of-fame career in the ABA and NBA. He began his college career at Garner-Webb before playing his final two seasons at Jacksonville.

Knicks coach Mike Brown is enjoying the post-championship life.

The coach and his wife Rochelle “Ro” Ledesma enjoyed some R&R in Porto Cervo, an Italian seaside resort in Northern Sardinia on Sunday in new beach photos obtained by The Post.

The couple, mostly private regarding their personal life, were seen canoodling in the ocean and laughing together while lounging under an umbrella.

Brown sported white swim shorts and sunglasses while Ledesma donned a blue bikini.

The pair’s European vacation came after a whirlwind summer for Brown.

In his first year at the helm, Brown coached the Knicks to their first championship in 53 years against the Spurs in June.

The Knicks won four of five against San Antonio, and clinched the NBA title in a 94-90 win in Game 5 of the NBA Finals.

After that, Brown’s media tour included stops at “The Tonight Show” and “Good Morning America.”

He also received a standing ovation and applause — as well as “let’s go Knicks” chants — when he hit up the Polo Bar in mid-June.

Brown and his first wife Carolyn, who divorced in January 2015, share two sons together, Elijah and Cameron.

Both played collegiate sports and Elijah began his basketball career at Butler before transferring to New Mexico and then finishing his college career at Oregon.

Brown has yet to be seen in photo from the wedding of Knicks center Karl-Anthony Towns and model Jordyn Woods, which took place Aug. 15 in Malibu.

Towns’ Knicks teammates, Jalen Brunson, Josh Hart and OG Anunoby were all in attendance.

NetsDaily has confirmed that the Brooklyn Nets are signing Nick Pringle, a 6’10”, 230-pound 24-year-old power forward out of Arkansas, to an Exhibit 10 deal. Pringle, who went undrafted in June, played last season at Arkansas with Darius Acuff and Trevon Brazile, drafted at No. 7 and 35th.

An Exhibit 1o can be a training camp contract, but the Nets and other teams have also used it to fill out G League rosters. The plan for Pringle will become evident shortly after he’s signed. Last couple of seasons, the Nets have signed players to Exhibit 10s then quickly waived them often within 24 hours. The players’ G League rights go directly to Long Island without a stop at Brooklyn’s training camp. Each player signed to an Exhibit 10 can receive up to an $85,000 bonus if they stick with the G League club for 60 days. While some organizations will negotiate the amount of the bonus, the Nets generally provide each signee the full $85,000. G League players also receive a standard $46,350 salary plus housing expenses.

Pringle had previously played at both Alabama and South Carolina in his six-year long collegiate career. At Alabama, he teamed up with Grant Nelson who played for both Brooklyn and Long Island last season and was on the Nets summer league rosters in Sacramento and Las Vegas last month.

A native of Seabrook, S.C., Pringle played at Wofford College in 2020-21, Dodge City Community College in 2021-22, then two seasons at Alabama in 2022-23 and 2023-24, a season at South Carolina in 2024-25 before winding up at Arkansas last year. He was part of Alabama’s 2024 NCAA Final Four team, averaging 6.2 rebounds per game throughout the Crimson Tide’s run in the NCAA Tournament.

Here’s some highlights from his season with John Calipari and the Razorbacks, primarily focused on his athlaticism.

Rebounding and defense have been his forte. For his collegiate career, played in 152 games with 81 starts, averaging 16.1 minutes a game. For his career, he scored 853 points and shot 64.9% from the field, twice hitting before than 70.0% for the season. He also grabbed 654 career rebounds and recorded 125 stocks — combination of steals and blocks.

He also played three games for the Celtics Summer League team in Las Vegas, but only one where he topped 20 minutes, a loss to the Magic. In that that game, Pringle scored four points, grabbed five rebounds, handed out four assists, blocked three shots and recorded two steals in 20.3 minutes.

Seros Partners, his agent, first reported on the Nets agreement Monday. Seros also represents Mikel Brown Jr.

Although the were unconfirmed reports during Summer League that Deon Brown, a 6’4” combo guard out of St. Louis, and Ben Humrichaus, a 6’9” small forward out of Illinois, would also join the Nets on Exhibit 10 deals. Both Tyler Bilodeau, taken at No. 43 out of UCLA, and Chaney Johnson, who’s returning, have signed two-way deals, leaving one open. Nelson is seen as a strong candidate for the third if he recovers from a “shooter’s knee” issue that sidelined him last season.

Betrayal, bloodlines and a battle for the throne.

Again.

Nine years after their last Game of Thrones-esque power struggle, the Los Angeles Lakers have somehow wandered back into Westeros, only this time the drama is more scintillating and vicious than ever before. 

Forget Succession, the better comparison is House of the Dragon.  

And Jeanie Buss is Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen. 

The similarities between the Buss family and the hit HBO show have become almost absurd. 

Both stories begin with an aging patriarch presiding over a powerful dynasty and making his succession wishes unmistakably clear.

In Season One, King Viserys chose his daughter Rhaenyra to inherit the throne, just as Dr. Jerry Buss chose his daughter Jeanie to become controlling owner of the Lakers. Those instructions were later reinforced by language in the family trust requiring the trustees to take reasonable steps to keep her in control. 

But then the patriarch died and everybody started reaching for the Iron Throne. 

Dr. Buss purchased the Lakers from Jack Kent Cooke in 1979. Under his family’s leadership, the Lakers have more wins than any franchise in history over that span and 11 NBA championships, more than any other team during their tenure. 

When Dr. Buss died in 2013, the family harmony he envisioned didn’t survive him very long. The Lakers become their own version of the Dance of the Dragons, except instead of Vhagar and Caraxes scorching the Red Keep, it was Jeanie and Jim’s lawyers scorching each other with court filings. 

Jim first tried to usurp Jeanie in 2017 after Jeanie fired her brother as head of basketball operations. Together, Jim and Johnny Buss pushed for a new Lakers board that conspicuously did not include their sister. Without a board seat, Jeanie could not remain the controlling owner. She got a restraining order, took them to court, stopped the maneuver and ultimately emerged with her authority strengthened. 

Pick whichever Buss brother you want to cast as Aegon II or Aemond or even Daemon Targaryen. The analogy doesn’t need to be anatomically perfect. The important part is the recurring theme of a family fighting for the throne after their patriarch has died. 

We’ve seen this show before. 

Only now the Targaryens all have private-equity portfolios and billions of dollars to play with instead of dragons. 

Last year, Jeanie agreed to sell the majority share of the Lakers to Mark Walter at a $10 billion valuation while working out a deal to remain governor of the team until 2030. Then immediately after Walter took over, Joey and Jesse Buss were dismissed from their basketball operations positions as the new regime began reshaping the organization. 

Jeanie instantly took on the role of villain within her own family. 

Queen Rhaenyra spent Season Two of House of the Dragon learning the uncomfortable truth about inherited power: that having a king proclaim you as the rightful heir doesn’t mean everybody around you will happily kneel. 

A coup was contrived by the Hightowers (House Green) and King Viserys younger sons Aegon II and Aemond. Aegon was crowned in Rhaneyra’s place and she was exiled to Dragonstone before a war between the family broke out for the throne. 

Jeanie is now entrenched in the Lakers version. 

According to ESPN, five of the Buss siblings voted on Monday to sell the family’s remaining 17.8% stake in the Lakers to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger after Walter agreed to sell his controlling interest at a $12.5 billion valuation last Wednesday. Jeanie was the lone sibling who did not vote for the sale, and now her attorney is arguing the transaction is “void” and cannot proceed under the terms governing the family trust. 

Why would she try to stop it?

Because if that 17.8% disappears or dips below 15%, then Jeanie would fall below the ownership threshold necessary to remain Lakers governor. 

The latest coup by the Buss brothers is so wonderfully House of the Dragon that it might as well have been ripped out of the script itself. Years ago, it was Jim and Johnny trying to usurp Jeanie’s power. Joey and Jesse were perceived as part of her side of the family power structure. Now the alliances have shifted again. 

And that’s the point of George R.R. Martin’s novel A Dance With Dragons that the show is based on. There are no permanent teams when a throne is involved. Allies become enemies. Enemies become useful. Family loyalty lasts right up until somebody believes they have the opportunity to sit on the Iron Throne. 

Even Jeanie’s sale to Walter now feels like the betrayal of Queen Rhaenyra’s new Targaryen bastard dragon riders from Season Three. The idea was to harness enormous outside financial power while still preserving her place atop the Lakers kingdom. Instead, Walter is already selling the team to Iger and Kushner less than a year after he took control. Now, Jeanie suddenly finds herself fighting to preserve the very authority the original transaction was designed to protect. 

And as House of the Dragon reminds us, power is easy to acquire, but much harder to keep. 

You won’t find dragons flying above Crypto.com Arena any time soon, but the fight for power of the Lakers now features billionaires, lawyers, trusts, emergency meetings, sibling alliances, and nearly half a century of family history hanging in the balance. 

For nearly 50 years, the Buss family has been Lakers royalty. Dr. Buss built the kingdom. Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and LeBron James decorated its walls with championship banners. 

But dynasties rarely fear outsiders as much as they should realize the real threat comes from within the household. 

King Viserys spent his final years believing his succession plan would preserve the Targaryen dynasty. 

Dr. Buss probably believed the same thing. 

But both fathers discovered the same truth:

You can name an heir, but you can’t make the family bend the knee.

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Florida point guard Xaivian Lee plans to enter the NCAA transfer portal, On3’s Joe Tipton reports. Lee spent one season with the Gators after transferring in from Princeton.

In 35 games last year, Lee averaged 11.6 points per game, 3.7 rebounds, 4.2 assists, shot 42% from the floor and 29.2% from three-point range. He also shot 76.5% from the free-throw line.

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Lee spent three years at Princeton before electing to hit the portal and play for the Gators last season. In three seasons with the Tigers, Lee averaged 12.7 points per game. 4.5 rebounds, 3.3 assists and shot 43.1% from the floor.

Lee entered the NBA Draft process earlier this summer and went unselected during the 2026 edition. He agreed to am Exhibit 10 deal with the Cleveland Cavaliers back in June. An Exhibit 10 deal is a one-year, non-guaranteed NBA minimum-salary contract that invites a player to training camp. It is often utilized by franchises to evaluate undrafted rookies along with fringe players and allows them to retain the player’s G League rights if they are waived.

Xaivian Lee hitting NCAA transfer portal again

Earlier this year, Xaivian Lee participated in the NBA G League Combine in Chicago. Lee was not among the six players invited to the NBA Draft Combine that week, but he made his mark in the two games he played and tested well in the various workouts. He led his team in assists on both scrimmages.

Lee ranked No. 1 overall in the pro lane drill at 9.97 seconds and also finished in the top five in the shuttle run (No. 2 overall), 3/4 court spring (No. 3) and vertical jump (No. 5). 

NBA scout Cyro Asseo wrote the following on Lee: “Played as a lead guard, prioritizing playmaking for his teammates over his own scoring. He grabbed any loose boards in his path and showed he can use his quickness for more than just scoring, though his defense remains a slight concern.”

GatorsOnline’ Keith Niebhur contributed to this report

It’s been 11 months since the NBA opened a formal investigation into the Los Angeles Clippers for salary cap circumvention, and somehow Adam Silver has only made it worse. We are no closer to knowing what exactly happened, there’s backbiting occurring between the NBA and the media — but more concerning is a pervasive opacity shrouding the process, pronounced enough that it feels less like the league is leading an investigation and more like it’s trying to navigate a balancing act that will satiate the public’s need for answers while not angering Clippers’ owner Steve Ballmer.

Pablo Torre initially broke the story last year, which alleged that the Clippers used a now-defunct sponsor to funnel money to Kawhi Leonard as a fake employee, allowing the team to exceed his max-level contract. The Torre report initially got the ball rolling and led to the NBA investigation — which is ongoing now.

Since that point, the NBA has largely been quiet, Torre has continued to gather more details, expanding on his reporting, and on Monday ESPN dropped a story that intimated the investigation was coming to a close, functionally absolving Ballmer of responsibility as a result — which the NBA then refuted. It’s all a mess, so let’s try to make sense of this from all angles right now.

Pablo Torre’s reporting

In September of 2025 Torre reported that Leonard had a $28M no-show deal with Aspiration, a green energy company, which functionally listed Leonard as an employee and spokesperson — when in reality he didn’t do any work for Aspiration. This was sourced through numerous ex-employees of Aspiration, who spoke to Torre anonymously and said it was a known secret inside the company that Leonard was being paid under the table on behalf of the Clippers

In August of 2026 a new report from Torre noted that Leonard had a second undisclosed endorsement deal with Daktronics, the company that made the video board for the Clippers. The nature of this deal has not been disclosed, though Torre says it was also sourced through employees of Daktronics.

ESPN’s reporting

Initially, ESPN was extremely quiet after Torre’s initial report. Then, in September of 2025 reporter Ramona Shelburne conducted a sit-down interview with Steve Ballmer that allowed him to explain the Clippers’ side of things, which was devoid of any hard-hitting questions. It essentially allowed Ballmer to absolve himself of responsibility, saying that he didn’t know anything about the deals — other than the fact that he made introductions between Aspiration and Leonard.

Reporting on ESPN’s side was quiet until this week, when a story was published by Don Van Natta Jr., Baxter Holmes, and Shelburne — which indicated that the NBA found no wrongdoing by Ballmer. Instead, the penalty was likely going to be focused on “failure to supervise,” saying that unnamed Clippers employees operated autonomously. In addition, the report indicated that the league and Clippers were working together on a resolution to the in investigation — which frankly should never, ever happen.

“The league presented initial findings of its investigation, led by law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, to the Clippers in late July, according to multiple people familiar with the matter. In recent days, both sides have been negotiating a resolution to the investigation, the people said.”

The NBA is denying the ESPN report, which we’ll get to in a moment.

The Clippers’ side of things

From the first report, the Clippers have alleged no wrongdoing. Ballmer has positioned himself as simply a man who made introductions between Leonard and companies he did business with, having no knowledge a deal took place to pay Leonard. They’ve characterized this as a normal procedure for NBA teams to make these introductions, which is accurate — and has started a firestorm over the possibility that organizing business connections could be considered salary cap circumvention in the future.

The NBA’s side of things

Adam Silver has dragged this process out for almost a year. That enabled the Clippers to retain the No. 5 overall pick in the 2026 NBA Draft without punishment, while also allowing them to find a trade that will send Kawhi Leonard to the Toronto Raptors once the salary cap investigation is complete.

A statement by the NBA late Monday vehemently denied the ESPN report, but failed to address specific details of what the league denied.

Once again, the NBA is asking for patience from the public on an investigation that has taken longer than it ever should have, essentially saying we’ll get all the answers once the investigation is complete. Still, there is no timetable on how long this is going to continue to drag on.

The factors at play now

One of the key reasons Adam Silver is so reviled as NBA commissioner is that his approach to everything when it comes to the league is that profit and expansion is more important than anything else, even competitive balance or fairness. Silver is light on punishment, even in the case of former Suns owner Robert Sarver who was fined $10M and suspended for one year after an investigation by the league found that he had routinely and often been racist, misogynistic, and inappropriate in the workplace. The punishment stopped short of forcing Sarver to sell the team, which he later did of his own will.

Sarver was a small player in the NBA’s circle of important owners. Steve Ballmer is a whale. The former Microsoft executive is the richest NBA owner by a significant margin, with a net worth of $152B — while also being critical to Silver’s goals when it comes to using the myriad business relationships Ballmer has to further the goals of the league.

Essentially Ballmer is the last owner Silver would ever want to punish for anything. As commissioner he doesn’t want to bite the hand that feeds, but these allegations are extremely damaging to the perception of the NBA. If the result of this investigation is too soft it will further erode public faith in the NBA as a whole, but too harsh at it will anger the league’s cash cow.

That balance is reportedly being worked on behind closed doors, according to the ESPN report from Monday. It makes it seem as if the Clippers have been found guilty of cap subversion; everyone in the room knows it, but now they are desperately trying to find a resolution together that will satiate the public without damaging Ballmer’s reputation or hurting his team too much. With pockets as deep as Ballmer’s, there’s functionally no fine imaginable that would be large enough to hurt him. Even if we imagine the same $10M fine that Sarver received, it would be the equivalent of 0.06% of his net worth — the same as a $60 fine for someone who earns $100,000 a year.

We all know what should happen. If the Clippers actively engaged in salary cap circumvention at any level, then they should be docked draft picks or forced to play under the NBA’s luxury tax for a set period. That will not happen. Silver does not want to harm the Clippers, not really. Nor will there be any suspension of Kawhi Leonard beyond a slap on the wrist, because to do more could void the trade to Toronto and hurt the Clippers as a result as well.

Nobody is going to be happy with the result of all this, except for Adam Silver and Steve Ballmer. That is how this is being engineered, and it’s by design. It’s a feature of the Silver-run NBA, not a bug.